Civil War Program and Exhibit at Ball State University Libraries

Frank A. Bracken Civil War Collection Presentation at Ball State University Libraries

The Ball State University community is invited to attend the opening of the Frank A. Bracken U.S. Civil War Collection on Monday, December 1 in Bracken Library.  A reception will be held from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. in the Helen B. and Martin D. Schwartz Digital Complex on the first floor of the library.  A tour of the exhibit will follow on the second floor in Archives and Special Collection.

A Friends of the Alexander M. Bracken Library program will be presented at 6:30 p.m. in Room 104 of the library.  Nicole Etcheson, Alexander M. Bracken Professor of History, will present “The Goodly Land of Hoosier: How the Civil War Changed Indiana.”  Etcheson is the author of Bleeding Kansas: Contested Liberty in the Civil War Era, A Generation at War: The Civil War Era in a Northern Community, and many other history books and journal articles.

The Frank A. Bracken U.S. Civil War Collection is comprised of a vast assortment of Civil War artifacts donated by Bracken, a former trustee with deep family ties to the University.  It focuses on battlefield preservation and showcases artifacts, photographs, weapons, maps, re-enactment uniforms, personal papers, and more than 300 academic and rare books about the War and President Abraham Lincoln.

The exhibit will be displayed on the second floor of Bracken Library outside the Archives and Special Collections through January 31, 2015.  To see the materials from the exhibit online, visit the University Libraries’ Digital Media Repository.

For more information about the exhibit or the program, contact John Straw, Assistant Dean for Digital Initiatives and Special Collections, at 765-285-5078.